Man-eating tiger in Karnataka forest tracked, captured

Bengaluru: The man-eating tiger, which was at large for five days, was tracked down and safely captured in Karnataka’s Bandipur reserve forest on Sunday after tranquilising it, an official said.
“The tiger was captured late in the afternoon (around 2:30 p.m.) with the help of Soliga tribals, who spotted it hiding in a bush,” state Chief Wildlife Warden Sanjay Mohan, who was supervising operations from outside the forest, told IANS over phone.
The tiger, aged 4 to 6 years, had killed two men since last month and a search was on for the animal since October 9 in the 872km Bandipur forest in the state’s Chamarajanagar district, about 220 km southwest of Bengaluru.
Soligas, who are experts in hunting the wild animals in the forests, found the tiger hiding in a thick bush and guided the guards and the vets to the spot.
“The tiger was hit by a tranquiliser dart by forest guards atop on an elephant based on the Soligas’ cues, but that attempt failed as it recovered quickly from the impact of the dart and crossed over a stream into another thicket. As a result, the Soligas had to again track it down,” said Mohan.
The Soligas, however, managed to spot it again and enable the big cat be hit with another dart, which succeeded in immobilising it, he said.